The Catholic Church has something to say about your paycheck

... And business leaders themselves can and should put these principles into practice today, said Bill Bowman, Dean of the School of Business and Economics at the Catholic University of America.

“The purpose of business is the human person. It's not to trade the human person like any other commodity,” he told CNA.

Bowman said that the Church shies away from a “one-size-fits-all” approach, instead setting principles around which an employer can balance people’s needs – such as a city's expensiveness or an employee’s family size, with the needs of the company is able to sustain itself. The result is that all businesspeople should be able to provide their workers with a just wage if they look towards innovative solutions.

He suggested that every businessperson should look carefully at what “a just wage really look like for this particular city where we're working. What would it look like for this employee, with a big family or a person with no family at all. If what we really want to do is provide enough money so that you can live a life and maybe put a little away on the side.”

“To just say 'well I can't afford it,' is, to me, to unnecessarily give yourself a 'get out of jail free' card.”

For entrepreneurs or startups facing tight budgets, Bowman noted that employers could work with employees to step up base pay with a company's growth or other “innovative” solutions he has seen from employers such as incorporating family size into bonuses or covering certain expenses like college tuition. ...